Desperado
11th September 2011, 21:27
This is really two separate ideas I've been entertaining for a while.
I don't adhere to capitalism necessarily being the last-stage before communism and it's economic liberation of humankind, as much as I agree with the historical aspect of Marx's conception of history and radical class analysis generally. Predicting capitalism under early feudalism would be near impossible. Under late feudalism, sure - that you begin to see those capitalistic elements emerging in society, and so maybe it could be argued that our ideas of communism are due to our late stage of capitalism. But Marx was hardly writing during the decay of capitalism, and the working class seems far less radical than it was. On the other hand, perhaps our ideas of communism are yet fully developed (the actual management of a communist society is still vague at best, unimaginable at worst). But I do not see communism as solely possible due to capitalism - it could have emerged under a feudal or slave society, and in isolated cases did - there was definitely far more of a communal basis in those less alienated societies.
Before the infant bourgeoisie and then proletariat began to emerge from feudalism, it's hard to distinguish the situation than if we were musing this as revolutionary peasants in a feudal society (where they would have been society's lowest class and thus those potential of full social revolution - something that Marx himself in a letter to a Russian saw as possible). And although capitalism has radically increased the potentials of our labour through technological advancement, I do not see this as a required prerequisite for a communal society - indeed, thus far it has simply alienated us further.
It seems plausible to me that capitalism may well develop into some new class society, where the proletariat and bourgeoisie watch some new classes emerge in society as the peasants and their masters did. Or indeed the road might end here, with capitalism destroying not just itself but much of civilisation (through ecological collapse), taking us back for the most part to square one (Einstein saying the fourth world war will be fought with sticks and stones).
This points me to the second, more whimsical and far less scrutinised idea which I saw as a basis for a sci-fi novel perhaps. What fears me the most is that, in an almost sickening way, class society is resolved - but not in the way we would see it. Capitalism, though depending entirely on the proletariat, has made them more and more useless - turning to machines to attempt to replace labour, this precipitating a crisis in itself (the falling rate of profit etc.). Of course, mass unemployment has been avoided through creating new needs - the continuous overproduction of capitalism coupled with stuff we don't truly require (consumer society, mass advertising). But this route is unsustainable (for all) with depleting resources and capitalist mismanagement*.
What if a section of the (more long-sighted and powerful) bourgeoisie was to abandon the proletariat. With the exponential technological advancements we are making, a life of luxury may be lived easily (for the few) without any need of much labour (other than pushing buttons and some tech expertise). The tide (metaphorically and literally) rising and resources disappearing, some of the elite (with their firepower) where to leave the proletariat as a mass of lumpen to live isolated. This new development would be enacted by some escaping bourgeoisie, not a class conscious proletariat able to enact their own communal social revolution. They are besides facing an economy of scarcity thanks to a now un-reversible ecological disaster brought upon them (rather than Marx's vision of a technologically advanced society for us them to take into our own hands), and would most definitely be in the savage shit. Not just a society split into two, but two entirely separate societies, one in Noah's ark and the other drowning in the flood.
*I am neither a primitivist nor a Malthusian - I believe a socialist society employing the sensible use of the technology and their own minds would be able to avoid such a crisis, but clearly under the current situation we are steering for disaster.
I don't adhere to capitalism necessarily being the last-stage before communism and it's economic liberation of humankind, as much as I agree with the historical aspect of Marx's conception of history and radical class analysis generally. Predicting capitalism under early feudalism would be near impossible. Under late feudalism, sure - that you begin to see those capitalistic elements emerging in society, and so maybe it could be argued that our ideas of communism are due to our late stage of capitalism. But Marx was hardly writing during the decay of capitalism, and the working class seems far less radical than it was. On the other hand, perhaps our ideas of communism are yet fully developed (the actual management of a communist society is still vague at best, unimaginable at worst). But I do not see communism as solely possible due to capitalism - it could have emerged under a feudal or slave society, and in isolated cases did - there was definitely far more of a communal basis in those less alienated societies.
Before the infant bourgeoisie and then proletariat began to emerge from feudalism, it's hard to distinguish the situation than if we were musing this as revolutionary peasants in a feudal society (where they would have been society's lowest class and thus those potential of full social revolution - something that Marx himself in a letter to a Russian saw as possible). And although capitalism has radically increased the potentials of our labour through technological advancement, I do not see this as a required prerequisite for a communal society - indeed, thus far it has simply alienated us further.
It seems plausible to me that capitalism may well develop into some new class society, where the proletariat and bourgeoisie watch some new classes emerge in society as the peasants and their masters did. Or indeed the road might end here, with capitalism destroying not just itself but much of civilisation (through ecological collapse), taking us back for the most part to square one (Einstein saying the fourth world war will be fought with sticks and stones).
This points me to the second, more whimsical and far less scrutinised idea which I saw as a basis for a sci-fi novel perhaps. What fears me the most is that, in an almost sickening way, class society is resolved - but not in the way we would see it. Capitalism, though depending entirely on the proletariat, has made them more and more useless - turning to machines to attempt to replace labour, this precipitating a crisis in itself (the falling rate of profit etc.). Of course, mass unemployment has been avoided through creating new needs - the continuous overproduction of capitalism coupled with stuff we don't truly require (consumer society, mass advertising). But this route is unsustainable (for all) with depleting resources and capitalist mismanagement*.
What if a section of the (more long-sighted and powerful) bourgeoisie was to abandon the proletariat. With the exponential technological advancements we are making, a life of luxury may be lived easily (for the few) without any need of much labour (other than pushing buttons and some tech expertise). The tide (metaphorically and literally) rising and resources disappearing, some of the elite (with their firepower) where to leave the proletariat as a mass of lumpen to live isolated. This new development would be enacted by some escaping bourgeoisie, not a class conscious proletariat able to enact their own communal social revolution. They are besides facing an economy of scarcity thanks to a now un-reversible ecological disaster brought upon them (rather than Marx's vision of a technologically advanced society for us them to take into our own hands), and would most definitely be in the savage shit. Not just a society split into two, but two entirely separate societies, one in Noah's ark and the other drowning in the flood.
*I am neither a primitivist nor a Malthusian - I believe a socialist society employing the sensible use of the technology and their own minds would be able to avoid such a crisis, but clearly under the current situation we are steering for disaster.